Hello all,
This is my first post here although I have been able to get a lot of good information browsing the forums. This is my first spring maintaining a 1/2 acre pond. My pond is about 30 yrs old and the previous owner never used any chemicals to treat the algae. Last summer I would get about 1/3rd of the pond covered in algae. I was all set to stock 10lbs of Tilapia until I went to my pond store for some unrelated items and asked what they thought about adding them to control the algae. They were totally against it. They told me a horror story about a customer of theirs that stocked them but was unable to harvest in time and they all sank at the end of the year and the Tilapia rotted on the bottom and ruined the pond. They did recommend Cutrine and muck pellets to get me started to control the algae. So I guess my long winded question is should I use Tilapia or chemicals?
Thanks,
Gklop
Gklop,
One of the things we try to do on this site is provide good solid empirical and scientific findings and knowledge.
There really doesn't seem to be a lot of main-stream research, but tilapia are used in many projects that get little exposure. These include everything from aquaponics to municipal sludge cleanup. The empirical evidence is pretty strong in their favor. In at least the last 5-10 years, we've seen very few downsides to the use of tilapia -- actually, I can't think of any.
I was one of several who fought hard to get tilapia legalized for pond use in West Virginia. There was fear they would get out of our ponds and become invasive species in public waters. It took a lot of convincing that tilapia cannot not survive winters in West Virginia, where open/public waters get well below the living conditions for tilapia. The only exceptions are very close to the expelled cooling water from a couple of very large power plants that use large water reservoirs for cooling.
I hate to say this, but most individuals in farm supply and other agriculture product outlets, have very little experience or education, involving aquaculture, especially pond/fish management. Yet, they are "trained" to be
allowed to sell chemicals that can do far more harm than good.
Yes, there are good and safe chemicals. Many can be purchased without an applicator's license. But, there is a mindset where the recommended amount is perfect, a little more is better, and way too much is even better. Under the right circumstances, they work. It is the possible abuse/mis-use that becomes a major issue that can affect your pond for the rest of its life.
Tilapia don't fit that profile. They can live in horrible water conditions while cleaning them up. They die when the water gets cool. As they die, they add nutrients -- which your pond may not need at that time. But, if you choose at least a three year program of using them, those issues pretty much go away. The use of sterile (triploid) grass carp can also provide great benefit, as long as you don't add too many.
IMHO, there are far more positive upsides to using tilapia for pond maintenance and as forage fish, than there are downsides. It is also my opinion that it is far too easy to seriously damage your water source for a very long period of time with too much copper, or other chemicals.
Lastly, if you have a lot of algae, it means you have far more nutrients in your water than the pond can reasonably take up. It responds with an overgrowth of algae and other plant life. There are two solutions to this which should be balanced. Drop the level of nutrients getting into your pond -- like cleaning or diverting runoff water from a cattle pasture or other big nutrient source. The other half of the equation is to add enough plant life to your pond to absorb many of these nutrients. It could be floating islands, shallow water plantings, etc. That too has to balanced against the use of grass carp.
Ask a lot more questions.
I hope a few others will join this thread with pros and cons.
Ken
